Thank you, Mr. Chair, for having me today. I will start where the previous speaker ended: on the question of minorities.
We think the approach of Canada and the broader international community to Syria should be guided by a clear lesson from recent developments. Unfortunately, we have observed that over the last year, whenever international legitimacy has been granted to the current leadership in Damascus, it has been used not to build inclusive governance but to centralize power and repress communities.
The United States and some European partners, together with Turkey, Qatar and the Saudis, are pursuing short-term stability through centralization, supporting a strong centre in Damascus in the hope of restoring order. In practice, however, centralization has produced a lot of repression. Kurdish regions remain under pressure. Alawite civilians have faced mass violence without accountability. Druze communities have suffered grave abuses, and the new Syrian authorities have already killed thousands of their own citizens, just as al-Assad was doing before. This centralization approach may reduce fragmentation in the short term, but it is also sowing the seeds of future conflict.
The agreement between the Kurds and Damascus signed on January 30 illustrates these risks. The agreement lacks international guarantees, monitoring and enforcement mechanisms, and binding protections for autonomy and political inclusion. At the same time, U.S. policy has moved toward closer alignment with Ahmed al-Sharaa, encouraging integration into a centralized system without sufficient safeguards. This has deepened the perception that pluralist actors are being sidelined in Syria.
We think Canada should adopt a different premise, which is that the inclusion of minorities is not only a matter of principle but also a structural requirement for sustainable stability. Kurds, Druze, Alawites, Christians and secular Arabs—and particularly women—are not simply communities to be protected; they are essential political actors who can serve as a counterweight within the system. Their meaningful inclusion can check authoritarian centralism, limit the dominance of any single ideological force—in this case, Islamism—and restrain Islamist and fundamentalist tendencies. Without such balance, power will concentrate and repression will follow.
This is why decentralization is essential. A decentralized system would provide real autonomy and protection for vulnerable communities, reduce zero-sum struggles over control of Damascus, institutionalize power-sharing across regions and communities and create checks against authoritarian domination. Decentralization is not fragmentation. It is not separatism. It is a framework that allows diversity to function as a stabilizing force.
We believe and strongly suggest that international legitimacy, reconstruction support and normalization with Syria must be conditional. They should depend on democratic governance, decentralization of power, inclusion of minorities and secular actors, and accountability for abuses. Without these conditions, external support for the new regime in Syria will only reinforce the very dynamics that destabilize Syria.
Canada is well placed to help rebalance western policy. Working with European partners, particularly the U.K. and France, Canada can promote a more sustainable approach, one that recognizes that stability comes not from concentrating power but from distributing it in a way that creates balance and restraint.
In that context, we recommend that both Canada and the broader international community should condition all of their engagement with Syria on democratic and decentralized governance; advocate for international guarantees and monitoring mechanisms, especially for the implementation of the agreement with the Kurds; reject unconditional legitimacy for Damascus; support inclusive negotiations involving all major communities; and promote decentralization as the core constitutional framework for stability.
Let me conclude by re-emphasizing that granting legitimacy to the new regime in Syria without conditions enables centralization and repression and ultimately fuels instability.
Stability in Syria, to repeat, will not come from concentrating power in Damascus. It will come from building a system in which diverse communities act as a counterweight, keeping authoritarian and fundamentalist tendencies in check. I urge Canadian policy-makers to help make that balance possible.
Thank you.